Taylor Kingston wrote:
Walbrodt * * England * *2530

I must correct myself here; Carl August Walbrodt was not English. He
was born in Holland and died in Germany. I had him confused with
Victor Wahltuch, who was born in England.

Phil Innes wrote:
Well, that is ever the subject of retrofitting ratings - are they really
equivalents? True, Lasker is refitted at 2720, 120 points clear of the
2007/8 rating leader - but I personally don't think this means that Lasker
would be equivalent, and that modern players contain so much more knowledge,
technique et al, that /on the same scale/ they would rate no more than 2500
with today's players.

Phil, you really think Lasker today would rate no more than 2500 Elo
today? I'd speculate that might be the case, at least at first, if,
say, we took the Lasker of 1900 and magically transported him to 2007.
But given a chance to study modern theory and other chess literature,
I suspect he would improve rapidly, were he motivated enough.

Incidentally, I have a tournament book [game scores, photos, analysis, with
a forward by Mark Taimanov] of the 1895, in Russian, with pictures never
before published in the West. I asked Stewart Reubin who, if anyone, had an
archive of the event? He didn't know of any central source.

The English version has some photos, of most but not all the
players. What all does the Russian version have?

I open the book at random and see game 190 is Marco-Mason which opened 1 e4
g6,

Pillsbury annotates that game in the English version. He describes
1.e4 g6 2.d4 d6 3.c3 Bg7 as perhaps "the least objectionable of the
Fianchetto openings" but says "most modern masters prefer to meet the
open game face to face."

a game which went 65 moves, and where black erred on move 21
annotates
MT, with c4?? instead of 21 ... f5,

Pillsbury made the same recommendation in 1896.

and again at 26 with Qb5-b3? where he
suggests instead Bh6.

Again Pillsbury said the same.

As an illustration of some of the original players, and of opening 'finesse'
we are still in the age of romance. Another game 189 Gunsberg-Albin began:
1. e4 e6 2 d4 d5 3. ed and then develops rather eccentrically, so that MT
gives better lines for both players every 2 or 3 moves until the denouement
at 46.

Sounds a lot like the 1896 notes by S. Tinsley, who gives 8 notes
for the first 17 moves. Can you be specific about what Taimanov says?
I'd be curious whether he's contributing original analysis, or just
repeating the original book.

Of course, Bird Lasker famously opened 1. f4 e5, just like the game I posted
here recently though Lasker preferred 4... f7-f5 0-1 & 34 moves. Pollack
Vergani also begins eccenticaly with 1 e4 c5 2 d4 cd 3 Nf3 e5 and black lost
in 23.

Poor Beniamino Vergani (1863-1927). The glory days of Italian chess
were long past, and he scored a miserable +2 -17 =2 to finish 22nd,
dead last. Worse than last, one might say, as he was 4½ points behind
the next lowest players, Mieses and Tinsley. The tournament book
tacfully says "he was slightly overmatched." Oddly, his two wins were
against Gunsberg and Schlechter, past and future world title
challengers, respectively.